Streams and Oxbows Arrive!

Since the Conservation Kick-Off at the end of April, the full size Tonka trucks and excavators have been buzzing around Heart Rock Ranch with amazing skill and speed.  The skills that the construction crew bring to the project is to be highly commended.  Not only are they artists with their excavators, they are equally sensitive to the surrounding land and disturbing as little as possible.  Completed so far are 1.3 miles of stream and interconnect channels to the 10 Oxbows (ponds) that are finished.  17 more Oxbows are in various stages of completion at this time as well.  Reseeding has begun in the middle portion of the ranch and that project will continue throughout the summer.

Oxbow and completed section of stream

Two interns, working through The Nature Conservancy, are assisting with plantings around the Wetland Cells that Ducks Unlimited initiated two years ago, as well as assisting with weed abatement in the upland areas of the ranch.

Heart Rock Ranch is happy to report that the eagle pair produced an eaglet this spring, and the family has been monitored on a weekly basis to ensure that the work going on is not putting stress on the family.  The Heron Rookery is very active with some twenty nests inhabited and the sounds of ducks, geese and sandhill cranes are a daily event.